Thus a significant proportion of those licences issued are for sponosored students that will most probably not be competing alongside you for a job.
BUT, they are competing with many pilots who had their CPL/IR's issued by other member states. There are many foreign pilots working in the UK. French, Scandinavians, Italians, Belgians and Spaniard's are just a few European nationalities I've flown with over the last couple of years. Not to mention the Brazilians, Americans and Canadians, all with JAA licences and entitled to work here for one reason or another.
Also there's the guys/girls from all over the EC that have just finished training and are applying to work here.